Welcome to Medical News Today

Healthline Media, Inc. would like to process and share personal data (e.g., mobile ad id) and data about your use of our site (e.g., content interests) with our third party partners (see a current list) using cookies and similar automatic collection tools in order to a) personalize content and/or offers on our site or other sites, b) communicate with you upon request, and/or c) for additional reasons upon notice and, when applicable, with your consent.

Healthline Media, Inc. is based in and operates this site from the United States. Any data you provide will be primarily stored and processed in the United States, pursuant to the laws of the United States, which may provide lesser privacy protections than European Economic Area countries.

By clicking “accept” below, you acknowledge and grant your consent for these activities unless and until you withdraw your consent using our rights request form. Learn more in our Privacy Policy.

Please accept our privacy terms

We use cookies and similar technologies to improve your browsing experience, personalize content and offers, show targeted ads, analyze traffic, and better understand you. We may share your information with third-party partners for marketing purposes. To learn more and make choices about data use, visit our Advertising Policy and Privacy Policy. By clicking “Accept and Continue” below, (1) you consent to these activities unless and until you withdraw your consent using our rights request form, and (2) you consent to allow your data to be transferred, processed, and stored in the United States.

Get the MNT newsletter

Email an article

You have chosen to share the following article:

How elderberries can help you fight the flu

To proceed, simply complete the form below, and a link to the article will be sent by email on your behalf.Note: Please don't include any URLs in your comments, as they will be removed upon submission.

We do not store details you enter into this form. Please see our privacy policy for more information.

E-cigarettes may cause cancer and heart disease, says study

They are usually marketed as a safe alternative to conventional cigarettes, but a new study suggests that e-cigarettes may still pose serious harm to health.

Researchers suggest that e-cigarettes may increase the risk of cancer and heart disease.

Researchers at the New York University School of Medicine in New York City found that mice exposed to electronic cigaratte (e-cigarette) vapor experienced DNA damage in the lungs, bladder, and heart, which could increase the risk of cancer and heart disease.

Such damage was also found in cultured human lung and bladder cells that had been exposed to e-cigarette vapor for the equivalent of 10 years.

Study co-author Moon-shong Tang, of the Department of Environmental Medicine at the New York University School of Medicine, and his colleagues recently reported their findings in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

E-cigarettes — also known as e-cigs — have soared in popularity in recent years, particularly among teenagers and young adults. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), more than 2 million middle and high school students in the United States report having used e-cigarettes in the past 30 days.

E-cigarettes are not approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as a quit-smoking aid, after the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force concluded that there is "insufficient evidence to recommend for or against [their] use for smoking cessation."

However, research has found that more than 80 percent of smokers believe that e-cigarettes could help them to quit, while more than 97 percent believe that the battery-powered devices can help to reduce the use of conventional tobacco.

The debate over e-cigarette safety

When it comes to our health, the CDC believe that e-cigarettes are not as harmful as conventional ones. Still, because e-cigarettes are relatively new to the market, precisely how harmful they are remains unclear.

That said, we are learning more and more about the potential dangers of e-cigarette use, or "vaping."

In 2017, Medical News Today reported on a study that linked the flavorings in e-cigarette liquid to impaired heart muscle function. A more recent report claims that there is "substantial evidence" that e-cigarette use increases heart rate, and that some chemicals in the vapor can harm DNA.

The study by Tang and team provides further evidence of the harms of e-cigarettes, after finding that exposure to e-cigarette vapor can damage DNA in a way that could cause cancer and heart disease.

E-cigarette vapor caused DNA damage

The researchers came to their findings by exposing 10 male mice to e-cigarette vapor — containing 10 milligrams of nicotine, which is comparable with what humans inhale — for 3 hours per day, 5 days per week, for 12 weeks.

When compared with a control group of mice that inhaled filtered air, they found that the mice exposed to e-cigarette vapor showed DNA damage in their heart, lungs, and bladder.

What is more, the scientists found that exposure to e-cigarette vapor halted DNA repair processes in the lung tissue of mice. They found the same outcomes when testing long-term exposure to e-cigarette vapor on human lung and bladder cells.

In conclusion to their findings, Tang and colleagues write:

"Based on these results, we propose that ECS [e-cigarette smoke] is carcinogenic and that e-cig smokers have a higher risk than non-smokers to develop lung and bladder cancer and heart diseases."

Critics of the research, however, claim that this study does not prove that e-cigarettes are harmful to health.

Talking to The Guardian, Peter Hajek — the director of the Tobacco Dependence Research Unit at Queen Mary University of London in the United Kingdom — says that the "study shows nothing at all about the dangers of vaping."

He continues, saying, "It doesn't show that vaping causes cancer. This is one in a long line of false alarms which may be putting people off the switch from smoking to vaping which would undoubtedly be of great benefit to them."

It seems that the jury is out on whether or not vaping can cause cancer and heart disease, but one thing is clear: more studies are needed to find out.

2019 Healthline Media UK Ltd. All rights reserved. MNT is the registered trade mark of Healthline Media. Any medical information published on this website is not intended as a substitute for informed medical advice and you should not take any action before consulting with a healthcare professional.